In the past, dispensing of pills was a tedious and timeconsuming job, wherein the pharmacist manually counted pills from a storage container and placed them in a vial. In addition to being inefficient, such procedures were subject to inaccuracies.
To overcome such problems, automatic counting and dispensing machines have been designed for more efficient and accurate distribution of pills. One such machine is described in applicants' previous U.S. Pat. No. 4,018,358 wherein a pill cassette is placed on a machine such that the cassette is in communication with a vacuum source in the machine and with a drive wheel for operating a conveying wheel in the cassette which carries pills from the bottom of a cassette to a discharge opening positioned above the vial. A photoelectric cell senses each pill carried to the discharge opening via a fiber optic scanner and an electronic counter counts the pills until the predetermined number of pills have passed through the discharge opening into the vial whereafter the machine automatically shuts down. The machine also can be used to count pills for inventory control purposes. The cassette includes an adjustable kickoff shoe adjacent to the conveying wheel for adjusting the vacuum applied to the pill such that the vacuum port of the wheel carries only a single pill to the discharge chute wherein the pill is separated from the wheel for exit through the discharge opening. The cassette also includes a rotatable agitator for preventing bridging of the pills within the chamber.
Such cassettes are subject to several problems. First, the kick-off shoe is not adjustable when the cassette is in position on the machine, and cannot be adjusted during operation of the machine. Also, the agitator rotates in the same direction as the conveying wheel such that there is a tendency for the pills to move away from the lower portion of the wheel. Furthermore, the interior of the cassette defines a single enlarged chamber and the pills therein accumulate and pile up against the conveying wheel so as to place undue pressure thereon. Also, when the machine shuts down and the vacuum therein ceases, pills carried by the conveying wheel and positioned over the discharge chute drop into the chute and exit through the discharge opening into the vial after the proper number of pills have been dispensed. Finally, there is no way to load additional pills into the cassette during operation of the machine.
Therefore, a primary objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette for use with a pill counting machine.
Another objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette wherein the kick-off shoe can be adjusted during operation of the pill counting machine.
Another objective is the provision of an improved pill cassette wherein the pills carried by the conveying wheel into the area above the discharge chute are quickly dropped into the chute for exit through the discharge opening after being counted.
A further objective of the present invention is the provision of a pill cassette wherein the agitator therein rotates in the opposite direction as the pill conveying wheel so as to maintain pills in contact with the lower portion of the wheel.
A further objective is the provision of a pill cassette wherein the pills, having been counted by an electric eye, will be quickly separated from the conveying wheel to insure a rapid and accurate count thereof.
Still another objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette wherein pills will not pass through the discharge opening of the cassette after the pill counting machine is shut off.
A further objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette wherein pressure on the pill conveying wheel is minimized.
Another objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette which can be loaded with additional pills during the operation of the pill counting machine.
Another objective of the present invention is the provision of an improved pill cassette which is economical to manufacture and efficient and durable in use.